THE Number One Secret To Achieving Goals

Setting goals is easy. Writing them down, though only done by a few, only takes a couple of minutes.

Goal achievement? Now we’re talking something that is a bit more challenging. But in the video below, I reveal the number one secret to achieving your goals. It doesn’t matter what area of life your goals represent – relationships, finance, spiritual, and so on – this powerful technique works. Why?

For one thing, it makes you stop and analyze the kind of activity and effort that is really necessary to achieve a particular goal. So it becomes a lot more concrete, and a lot more real to you. For another, it breaks the goal down into bite-sized pieces, reducing the intimidation factor.

For example, say you want to lose forty pounds. What would be less overwhelming, just to write down, “I will lose forty pounds by July”?, or, “I will lose two pounds a week”?

Two pounds is a lot less intimidating than forty!

The secret is to use a Vision Map. The basics of a Vision Map go like this: Write down the big goal. Then, write down all the steps needed to reach that goal. For each step, write down all the tasks you will need to do to complete each step.

I’m going to take an easy example: writing a non-fiction book. That’s the goal: write a book. Of course, you would be a lot more specific about it, like, “Write a book about stress,” or, “Write a book on flower arranging.” But for our purposes, let’s keep it generic.

What are the steps needed to write a book? Off the top of my head:

Outline or map the topics of the book.

Decide what chapters to create from the topic.

Write one chapter per week.

Proofread and edit/rewrite the book.

Get a book cover designed.

Publish it.

Each of those steps can be broken down into several tasks. Here’s how you might break down step number one, outlining the book.

Buy large manila paper for drawing out a mind map.

Write the main topic of the book in the middle.

Write down all the subtopics, and details of the subtopics, you can think of on the topic.

Do some research to make sure you haven’t missed any subtopics you wanted to include in your book.

Finish the mind map, and set it aside after a week.

As the week goes by, add anything more to the mind map that you think of.

Tell me the truth: does not breaking down the steps make the idea of writing a book seem to be a lot less intimidating?

Put this success factor to work, and you may just end up the only one in your neighborhood who actually ends up achieving all their goals?